


Angels and Other Breakable Things

by Drowsy_Salamander



Series: Nouns and Other Adjectives [2]
Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Angst, Mild Gore, Non-binary character, Other, discussions of God, i just love this garbage fire of a ship, no beta we die like men
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-24
Updated: 2019-07-24
Packaged: 2020-07-17 23:16:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,314
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19964845
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Drowsy_Salamander/pseuds/Drowsy_Salamander
Summary: Beelzebub Falls in rage and pain. They hate Her and Heaven. They hit the ground and rise in Hell to be a Prince. They go to Earth start Satanism and find a confrontation they may not have been ready for.





	Angels and Other Breakable Things

**Author's Note:**

> I feel like this has a tone problem and i'm blaming this solely on the fact that I just cannot be serious.

They were burning. The air whipped around them, sharp as the sword strapped to their side. Their hair was on fire. A torch quickly burning through its fuel. The flames reached their head. The air grabbed at their wings, snagging every feather and ripping them out of their wings. The eyes that had been on their wings were plucked out of their feathery sockets and tossed to the mercy of the wind. The air scratched at their eyes and when they opened their mouth to scream, the wind and fire rushed inside to tear at their throat. As they Fell, the gold on their face was forcibly peeled off leaving only the muscle and bone behind, vulnerable to merciless fire. The pain was so much that they thought they might burst. There was no release to be found, screaming only hurt more and tears burnt their face. The tears were still holy even though their body wasn’t. They wished for mercy from God or Azreal, they didn’t care. They just wanted the pain to end. It never did. The Fall was endless. They would Fall, burning for all eternity for their rebellion.

As they Fell, their pain melted and tempered their rage, strengthening it and honing it into a stronger weapon. How dare She cast them out of Heaven into this vortex of unimaginable agony. What crime had they committed that even their very name must be rent from them. They had simply been confused by the humans and Her preference of them over the angels. What worth did these wingless, ground-walkers have? They were ignorant, ungrateful and utterly, utterly useless. Yet She would choose these imbeciles over her first children, cast them aside as just another creation. Unimportant. She would’ve had them sit outside an empty temple forever purposeless and drifting. With hindsight, that would’ve been preferable over this eternal burning.

They hated Her. They hated Her as they’d never hated anything before. They hoped that She and all those other angels that had stayed in Heaven. They wanted to soar back up and tear every angel apart so they could feel some semblance of their torture.

They hit the ground. [1] The impact dislodged their innards, bones shattering and muscles twisting. The heat was unbearable causing their already broken body to collapse, blood and sweat mixing with the pus and sulphur coating the rock. They lay in oppressive heat, wings occasionally twitching and felt rage. They could hear other angels completing their Falls and slamming into…. wherever they were. They listened to their moans and wails and felt distaste at their helplessness.  
Slowly, easing distressed limbs into action, they reposition themselves and push their body up. They can see through the smoky gloom, the bodies of the Fallen shuddering. They can also see a few struggling to their feet and one person, standing straight up. Breathing heavily, they push themselves up and stand, swaying. With a titanic effort, holding their fractured body together with hatred and rage, they place one foot in front of the other and walk through the heat and excruciating pain until they are facing the Morningstar, Her most perfect creation, the first to Fall. They stare at him.

He is still beautiful. His wings were simply now black, not white and the manic gleam in his eyes was more obvious and disquieting but he was still handsome. He looks at them, almost impressed by their fast recovery than he turns his attention to the other Fallen angels walking over to them. There were four others. Morningstar appraised them.

‘You are the strongest of the Fallen,’ he said in a manner that showed that while this was an achievement, it was an achievement in the same way as being the fastest snail was an achievement. ‘You shall be my princes and when the day comes, you shall lead our army [2] to destroy Heaven once and for all.’

They smiled a feral grin of teeth.

There was the matter of names of course. They settled on Beelzebub. They liked the it buzzed in their mouth and sounded discordant. It fit them like a glove. [3] Their very being was discordant now, broken glass that kept scraping and a buzz rose out of their core and it was all they could do to not continuously let it be heard.  
Then the princes of Wherever-This-Place-Is had to decide what this new locale was called and, Heaven, just what they were now. This took a surprisingly long time until after what had to be a year of arguing it was decided, this was Hell, and they were demons [4]. Then there was the matter of rebuilding. An entire city needed to be carved out of the cave and then a registry of who exactly they even had. The organisation of ten million demons into something resembling order took several centuries.

In this time, Beelzebub has managed to find a demon who thrived doing organizational work. They were quick to snatch Dagon up to work under them and not one of the other Princes, right bunch of opportunistic bastards that lot were. They made a point to grab any demons that seemed like they be useful. They were particularly proud of getting Crawly under their jurisdiction. It’d been a difficult fight; all the princes wanted the demon who tempted humans to fall under their command. Beelzebub had probably started an eternal feud with Asmodeus in the process [5] but that was beside the point.

Once all that was through with then they got the opportunity to see the Earth and Her most favoured children. They left Ligur and Hastur in charge of their domain and cautiously ventured to the Middle Floor. The Earth was already teeming with life. It was quite disgusting. Beelzebub watched with distaste as a bird brought its mate, nursing their eggs, a worm. They turned away, not wanting to see such caring between anything. It was off-putting. But the local fauna wasn’t the purpose of their little trip and they set off to find the nearest human settlement. According to the reports Beelzebub had been receiving from their field agents [6] humans were really bad at doing anything, and especially bad at doing Good. There was something rather satisfying about that.

After about ten minutes of walking without finding a town or even a road, their rather limited patience snapped and they dissolved into a swarm of flies. There must have been thousands, all tightly compressed into a humanoid shape but then they spread out. Beelzebub would’ve smiled if they’d had a face at the moment. It was so nice to just stretch out like this. There just wasn’t the space in Hell. The feel of the air under their wings and the sun on their backs was so achingly familiar and yet so gloriously different. In that moment, Beelzebub felt truly free of Her. Eventually, one of their flies saw a collection of buildings and the swarm gathered. This took quite a bit of time; the flies had spread out over a very large region and there was always one that got lost on the way back. But they all coalesced into their humanoid form. [7]

The demon began their walk into the town, keeping an eye on anything they could see. On the dirt road leading into the town there was a woman and a …. miniature human. Beelzebub had heard of these but the word had slipped from their mind as all pointless information does. The miniature human stared at them. Beelzebub tried to ignore them and kept walking only to be interrupted by the most unpleasant sound they’d ever heard. That was including the screams of demons hitting Hell for the first time. The small human was crying. Crying was hardly a revolutionary concept to them. They’d seen angels cry at the beauty of Her world, demons cry in despair at their Fall and they themselves had cried when Gabriel had— That thought was quickly cut off. But they’d never heard a tiny human cry before and it was most unpleasant.

The parent was trying to calm it, even as it raised a hand and pointed at them. It chocked out ‘She’s scary,’ and continued wailing.  
Beelzebub stared at it and felt slightly self-conscious, a new experience and not one they liked. They had never been vain or took much notice in their appearance but it was hard not to notice the differences. Ash mingled with their hair that was permanently windswept. Their face healed over in a mess of scabs and boils, painful and itching. The most tragic change was their wings. They just didn’t have wings anymore. Every single feather had been torn out and no new one grew back, all that remained were bones with loose skin hanging off. They kept their wing corpses to themselves. It wasn’t an unusual choice and Beelzebub suspected that many other demons shared their wing-state but there was still something humiliating about it. Especially when beside Lucifer’s brilliant, black wings that seemed to have just gotten more beautiful after Falling. At any rate the stupid, tiny human couldn’t see their wings.  
The mother looked vaguely as though she wanted to apologise for her brat of an offspring but also really didn’t want to talk to this hideous thing of indeterminate gender, so instead simply hurried the miniature-human away. Beelzebub sent a rather vindictive curse after the pair of them, ruining the rest of their lives, and continued on.

The town itself, collection of mud huts in their opinion, was small but efficient with a market place, small sick building and, most disturbingly, a place of worship. Beelzebub approached the building warily. It was the most elaborate structure with stone and wood used in its construction and some kind of painted warning over the entrance. They walked inside and coughed. The air was heavy with holiness. They’d forgotten just how suffocating angelic auras were. The interior was simple with a well swept floor and a small alter in the centre. A small statue carved from some white rock rested on top of a pedestal. Beelzebub picked up the statue and examined it. It was basic with rather crude features but the wings were unmistakeable. That wouldn’t do.

They couldn’t tell which angel it was meant to be; it may just have been a generic depiction of an angel but Beelzebub didn’t really care. (It was actually Selaphiel but no one really cared about Selaphiel and he was very quickly forgotten about. [8]) They cradled the figurine gently in the hands, remembering all their comrades in Heaven. In this lighting, the white of the stone looked blue almost purple even. They smiled softly to themselves and then hurled the statue at the ground with all their strength. The ground rippled as the statue smashed into smithereens.

They walked out of the building breathing heavily. The whole town had come out to see what that small earthquake was and Beelzebub faced them. The humans had weapons and a couple miniature-humans were clinging to their parents for reassurance. Beelzebub supposed that even humans could sense that small wave of demonic energy. ‘Alright then,’ they buzzed, giving the humans a glare [9] to quell any thoughts of fighting, ‘who’szz in charge around here?’

There was a mumbled debate and much shuffling of feet. ‘Harold, it’s you’ ‘Oh no, no, no it’s definitely Veronica. I mean she’s a real pillar of the community’ ‘Our leader is Sabastian!’ ‘You’re just saying that ‘cos I won’t be giving you a discount on my grain.’ Beelzebub pinched the bridge of their nose. ‘It doeszzn’t matter.’ The humans released a sigh of relief. ‘Point being, there’szz going to szzsome changeszz. Szztarting with thiszz temple.’  
‘Er, what do you want?’ One voice from the crowd called out. ‘Cos if it’s the murals or some’ing then you’re out of luck ‘cos the painter’s gone’  
‘Yeah, ‘e’s gone off to the big city, said “this small-town life was really holding ‘im back”’

‘No, no it’s not the damned muralszz!’ Beelzebub hissed in annoyance. The flies around their head buzzed angrily and practically vibrated in place. They took a couple deep breaths to calm down then they grinned. A truly terrible grin that put more fear into the humans than the glaring. ‘Have you heard the good newszz of Szzatan?’

This was how they started the first cult of Satanists.

For the next few months they bounced around from village to town to village spreading the “good news”. They personally found this joke hilarious and the demons they ran across also had a good laugh about it. There was something utterly delightful about turning human’s devotion away from Her and Her angels towards the very beings She wanted to protect the humans from. Actually being worshipped as a deity was fun too. All they had to do was show a simple display of infernal power, have any vaguely holy sight burned to the ground and then watch as the humans ran with the idea. Their favourite human invention was the idea that gods needed sacrifices and Beelzebub as acting-god got to consume all the sacrifices. They discovered that 1) eating was good and 2) human cooking was the only worthwhile thing about the species and almost made their existence justified. Beelzebub liked food.

But all good things must come to an end and when demons are involved that end tends to involve rathe more fire than is considered a healthy amount in a balanced diet. Case in point, literally any job Ligur and Hastur are ever given. [10] So when Beelzebub could sense a dramatic increase in holiness in the region, they carefully stepped out and addressed all the humans they had worshipping Hell with a simple instruction. ‘Burn everything to the ground.’

And the humans did.

Those humans would then flee, escaping most of the Holy JusticeTM and continue spreading the cult of Satan for the next six millennia. [11]

While the city was burning, Beelzebub lounged lazily on a heap of rubble and waited for the heavenly hosts to realise that there was nothing for them to smote. They’d always known that they couldn’t keep the jig [12] up eternally and it had been a fun decade. It was rather funny, thinking about angels searching tirelessly through the fire for humans to save only to realise how thoroughly they’d lost. That thought warmed Beelzebub almost as much as sitting in literal fire. That sense of fun cooled slightly when they realised just who exactly Heaven had sent to deal with the demon-worship.

Gabriel’s wings beat away the smoke and seemed to shine in air. He was dressed in the finest regalia with a sword at the ready and his (in)famous horn hanging at his side. He was literally glowing with Holy light. It was all very showy and melodramatic in Beelzebub’s opinion. They ignored the fact that they had been dramatically waiting for the angles in the middle of a destroyed town still on fire. Being a hypocrite held no shame for them.

Gabriel arrived before them in a blaze of glory slightly undermined by their rather uncomfortable expression. ‘Oh, it’s you,’ He regarded them the way most people regard cockroaches.

‘It’szzz me,’ they bared their teeth. They tried not to feel self-conscious of their verbal tic. They couldn’t quite manage it and there was something about Gabriel’s stupidly perfect voice that made them feel embarrassed about themselves.

‘What’s with the,’ Gabriel waved a vague hand at them, ‘everything?’

‘Not a fan of the new look?’ they buzzed, their flies orbiting faster.

Gabriel ruffled his wings. ‘Well,’ he swallowed, ‘well, that’s what happens to-to bad angels.’

A rather large part of Beelzebub wanted to laugh. Another part of them wanted to cry. They settled on giving him a derisive look. ‘You never change, do you? You’ve got your head jammed up your aszzz.’

Gabriel looked rather affronted by their vulgarity. ‘I have come to thwart your evil deeds,’ He brandished his sword and then said as though reading from a script. ‘Now begone foul demon to the pit from whence you came!’

‘Nah,’ Beelzebub intoned, fiddling with a piece of their hair. ‘I didn’t know which angelic baszztard I waszz going to get but of courszze it was you,’ Beelzebub hadn’t really thought about Gabriel since their Fall. This had been a conscious choice. If they had thought about him then they could acknowledge the fact that they really had loved Gabriel back in Heaven and that they had been deeply hurt by his sudden departure. If they had thought about Gabriel then they would be able to say that they’d been very lonely in Heaven and rather abandoned both by Her and, later, by Gabriel. They’d been incredibly isolated away from most other angels and it had made them angry. And, if they were being truly honest with themselves which they weren’t, they would admit that they were still lonely in Hell and missed Gabriel’s companionship while still being furious at him for just leaving on top of their hatred of all of Her angels. It was hard because Beelzebub’s feelings for Her and Gabriel and Heaven were impossible to separate and it was practically impossible to think about the fact that they still had some positive emotion towards all of those things, in fact that just made them angrier. All of this was too much so Beelzebub had just shoved all their emotions into a box which was then tied up, locked and left abandoned in the darkest recesses of their mind. But having Gabriel here was threatening to drag out that box of gross emotions while his dickish demeanour was just setting them off. ‘Blow this, I’m going.’ They hopped off their rubble pile and set off, fully intending to start up the same con in the next town they arrived in and forgetting all about Gabriel and his stupid purple eyes—

‘--I wish you hadn’t Fallen,’ Gabriel called out as they walked away. Beelzebub stopped and turned to look at him. It was the first honest thing he had said so far, said so genuinely that it hurt their demonic nature. They turned around. Gabriel simply stood there. His sword was no longer raised in a threat but now hung by his side. ‘I wanted you to have not Fallen.’

‘Sorry to disappoint then,’ They intended it to come out venomously but their voice had gotten weirdly choked. Emotions were stupid. [13]

‘If I could’ve stopped you from Falling, I would’ve.’

‘Don’t szzay that.’ They hissed.

‘Why not? I could’ve stopped this from happening to you, you would still be angel if it wasn’t for me.’ Gabriel’s tone was somewhere between guilty and self-assured. A bizarre combination for anyone not the Archangel Gabriel.

‘Becauszze,’ Beelzebub intoned, ‘it didn’t happen to me. It wasn’t your fault or anyone else’szz. It waszz my choice. I choszze to Fall and I didn’t need anyone interfering in that.’

This was a difficult concept for Gabriel. ‘But-but why would you choose this,’ It was said with disgust.

‘Because thiszz iszz who I am, you liked me better aszz angel, well that’szz your problem. I’m better aszz a demon.’

‘That is just an incorrect opinion. Demons are vile and unnatural.’ Gabriel smiled at them [14] and Beelzebub wanted to slap him.

‘You are inszzufferable,’ they muttered, ‘and if you don’t think demons were a part of Her plan then you’re even more of a fool than I thought.’

This caught Gabriel off-guard, ‘What in Her name do you mean that the Almighty intended for your lot’s existence? When Armageddon comes, we will annihilate you all for your unholiness.’

Beelzebub’s flies buzzed angrily as one of their eyebrows twitched, ‘Firstly, when Armageddon comes my side will win and I will tear your wings from your back, slowly, so slowly you will feel every feather you loose so you will have some tiny idea of just what Falling is like.’ For a second an expression of manic anger shone on their face but then they shrugged, the passion leaking from their body. ‘Secondly, if She really is “Almighty” and all Her actions are ineffable and there’s the big, old Ineffable Plan, then how can any part of it go wrong? If we all do everything according to Her plan whether we know it or not then how can anything have been a mistake? The Rebellion, the Fall, all just a part of Her plan from the start. How many angels are there?’

It was such a non-sequitur that it got an honest answer from Gabriel. ‘About ten million.’

‘And there’s about ten million demons. Equally sized armies, equal strength, equal influence on her precious humans.’ They spat the word out, ‘Do you really think there just happened to be equal numbers of Questioning angels as there were loyal ones?’ The demon calmed slightly; their flies no longer agitated. They just seemed tired now. ‘Nothing has free will, we’re all one big experiment to Her. But at least I’m on the side that can curse Her name for setting us all up as pieces on a board.’

‘You’re wrong.’ Gabriel said. He’d heard what they said and had to admit that they did make some excellent points and maybe it was true that God had intended for the Fall but ‘That doesn’t change the fact that we are Her children and She loves all her creations. We were all create to serve Her glory even the humans have a part in Her plan.’

Beelzebub snorted. ‘Alright wank-wings, you keep praising her name but She doesn’t care about us.’

‘There is no “us”’ Gabriel fiercely denied. Beelzebub looked surprised not realising what they’d said. Then nodded.

‘There is no “us”. I can’t believe I’m agreeing with you.’ They stared at Gabriel. ‘You should’ve Fallen.’

‘You should’ve stayed.’

Neither of them said “I miss you” or “I’m sorry I’ll have to kill you one day”. They were both too loyal to their factions to say anything of the sort. They stared at each other in the burning rubble. Unsaid messages flew between the pair until they parted. It was Gabriel who broke away first, flapping his huge wings to soar into the sky until he was so tiny, Beelzebub couldn’t tell him apart from the clouds. They left too.

They continued their work in the next town they went to, spreading false beliefs and steering humans down the wrong path but it had rather lost its fun and they would return to Hell in just a couple of months’ time. They would be the first Prince back and got saddled with all the administrative work while the rest were off having fun. This is how they would end up Lord of the files and in charge of paperwork in Hell. A thankless task for which they wouldn’t even get a computer for.

But that was in the future.

In the now, Beelzebub entered another city, this one rather big for the time. They found the resident holy building and shattered the first angel statue they saw.

If they’d looked closer at the remains, they would’ve seen a purple painted hand gripping a horn and another holding a sword.

They definitely missed the way one of their flies settled on the remnants.

[1] Ground is probably too generous.  
[2] In that moment, no one thought to ask the important question of just what army that was exactly.  
[3] Well not just like a glove. Like a full uniform more accurately but this is just semantics.  
[4] Demons had just managed to edge out ‘anti-gels’ and ‘ungles’  
[5] When Armageddon didn’t happen, Asmodeus was the first to try to put Beelzebub’s head on the chopping block and probably would’ve succeeded if it wasn’t for the fact that they suggested the Holy Water idea too and, well, we all saw how that turned out. Wasn’t too hard to turn the situation right around and have Asmodeus be blamed. The point is that Hell is full of office politics that mostly consist of the five princes trying to get the others in trouble.  
[6] Early on, Crowley wasn’t the only field agent, he was just the only competent one. Of course, most of that competence came from human ingenuity but hey, who was going to know?  
[7] That is to say, most of the flies transformed back. As with every large group, there were one or two that didn’t get the memo and missed out on the event. They’d just spend the rest of the time circling Beelzebub’s head as some form of compensation.  
[8] Odds are you’ve already forgotten his name  
[9] One of their weaker glares, they didn’t want to instantly vaporise them. Some of Beelzebub’s stronger glares could kill weaker demons as easily as Holy Water.  
[10] Ligur and Hastur were blunt instruments, the lacked precision but by the time they were finished there would be nothing but rubble left of whatever task they were set. They were useful like that. Every tool box needs a hammer.  
[11] Beelzebub got a commendation for their work and a rather shiny medal.  
[12] The jig would eventually be introduced to humans in the 16th century but that was only after it existed as a demonic dance for 5,000 years. All demons can dance but no demon can dance well.  
[13] They were so caught up in how stupid emotions were that they didn’t even notice that their speech impediment was temporarily gone. A feat that wouldn’t happen again for several centuries.  
[14] A smile that very clearly communicated “I don’t respect you and you’re wrong but I’m too nice to say that” Except often Gabriel would then just say “that” so it was rather a moot point.

**Author's Note:**

> So in some interpretations, Beelzebub is, like, the prince of false gods so I just had to do a Satanism joke. Also this is back before they became 6000% done with everything so they still show emotion, at least that's my excuse for this melodramatic fanfare.


End file.
